Across the square, she could see the broad, open door of Mr. Lambert’s warehouse, where already two men in blue shirts were at work tossing a fresh wagon-load of corn husks into the well-filled loft. Early to bed and early to rise was the motto of the industrious folk of Frederickstown, one and all. Wagons covered with white canvas hoods, and filled with tobacco, others, overflowing with pumpkins, celery, apples and cranberries—all the rich autumn produce of the fertile farming country beyond the town—were rumbling over the cobblestones in a picturesque procession, on their way to the market-place. And the well-known smell of the rimy vegetables was to the adventuresome Jane an almost irresistible call to the open. Her meditations were soon cut short by a final summons—and this in the firm cold tones of Mr. Lambert himself—to breakfast. “Jane! Coming? Or must I fetch you?” “Jiminy!” said Jane, and banging down the window she fled, clattering down the old wooden staircase like a whirlwind. In the large, sunny room, which served nearly all purposes, the family had gathered for breakfast; Granny Winkler at one end of the table—a miniature old lady with a frilled cap,—Mr. Lambert at the other end, Carl at his right and flaxen haired Elise at his left, Mrs. Lambert with one twin beside her and another facing her. Jane’s chair, between Elise and Lottie was still conspicuously empty. A door at the right of the dining room opened into the bakeshop, and a second door at the back led to the kitchen, from which the exquisite odors of the day’s outlay of fresh cakes and bread were already issuing. The big, bright room, with its casement windows opening onto the small garden hemmed in by high brick walls, with its pots of geraniums, and Chinese lilies,—which were Elise’s special care—its immaculately dusted cupboards on whose shelves gleamed rows of solid old German pewter ware, was the scene in which the Lambert’s, great and small, carried on a large part of their daily affairs. In one corner stood Mr. Lambert’s squat, business-like desk, where every evening, from nine to ten, he went over his accounts. At the round table in the center, the family ate their meals, and at night, the children prepared their lessons, while Grandmother Winkler, seated in her padded rocking chair, read her Bible, or nodded over her knitting. When Jane made her unceremonious entry, the family was seated, and, with their heads bent reverently over their plates of steaming porridge, were reciting grace in unison. Mrs. Lambert, glancing up, made her a sign to take her place as inconspicuously as possible; and accordingly just before Mr. Lambert raised his head, she slipped into her chair.